Allan Holdsworth's Guitar Gear

Allan Holdsworth is a British fusion jazz guitar player and composer. He's one of the key figures of fusion jazz, but doesn't always get the recognition he deserves.

Allan Holdsworth taught himself how to play guitar, he's got a very advanced knowledge of chords and scales, but he can't read note script.

Allan has a very unique sound and musical interpretation. His horn-like tone and phrasing is a result of:

On the first place, his hands. In an interview he says that you make the sound with your hands and you can fine-tune it with your gear.

His guitar rig: the guitars, amps and effects he uses (see further).

His legato playing style, he avoids picking notes (the contrary of players like Al Di Meola).

The use of the tremolo bar.

A legato style of playing requires a lot of sustain. The traditional way of getting sustain is using distortion, but Allan Holdsworth never liked using distortion to get sustain. That's when his search for the right gear started.

Here's a breakdown of Allan Holdsworth's guitar equipment:

Guitars

Allan Holdsworth is a big fan of headless guitars. In his own words:

If you get used to playing a headless guitar, it's really hard to go back to a headstock. I can't really describe it, it just feels awkward.

Steinberger Guitars

Ned Steinberger, a friend of Allan Holdsworth, is a luthier who's known for his minimalist headless guitars and basses. His most famous guitar model is the L-series guitar, made of a graphite and carbon fibre mix. The tuners are located at the tailpiece, the strings have a ball at both ends.

Another famous invention of Ned Steinberger is the Trans-Trem, a device that enables to transpose the tuning of the guitar.

Bill DeLap Guitars

Bill DeLap is a Monterey based luthier. He has built several guitars for Allan, including a Steinberger model and some baritone guitars. Allan used the Steinberger Bill Delap until he hooked up with Carvin. He now switches back and forth between the two.

Carvin Guitars

Because Bill DeLap guitars took too long to make, Allan Holdsworth approached Carvin about making him a guitar.

The result is the Carvin HF2 and HF2 Fatboy. These are the guitars he uses in the studio most of the time, live he plays the DeLap guitars.

The HF2 is semi-hollow, the fatboy completelyhollow.

Synthaxe

The Synthaxe was made by Bill Aitken in the 80s and is a fretted, guitar-like MIDI controller with or without a breath controller.

Nowadays there are about 1000 pieces of this instrument in existence and Allan Holdsworth owns 2 of them.